A Memory of Demons

by Ambrose, David

  ‘No – promise now,’ she said, with an edge of reawakened determination in her voice.

  ‘Let’s talk about it in the morning,’ Tom repeated feebly. ‘We’re all tired now. I think we should go to sleep.’

  The child looked at him with an odd mixture of distrust and acceptance. It was as though she was debating whether to argue, or let the matter drop. She chose to let it drop.

  When her door was closed, Clare rolled with weary gratitude into Tom’s arms. They lay in silence for a while. Then Clare spoke in a little voice, as though afraid both of the words she was speaking and the thought behind them.

  ‘Pam said something tonight, after dinner.’

  Pam was Charlotte’s mother, a sympathetic, kindly woman. Tom waited for Clare to go on, but when she did not, he prompted her.

  ‘What? Tell me.’

  Clare pulled away from him and sat up on the edge of the bed with her back to him, as though needing to put some distance between them before she could say what she had to.

  ‘She said that she’d read something a long time ago, some article, about children who were born with memories of past lives.’

  She paused again, but this time it was Tom who deliberately said nothing. She turned to look at him with a question in her eyes. She needed a reaction from him.

  He dropped his gaze from hers, thinking how strange it was that he found it so hard to look at her in that moment.

  ‘Memories of past lives – reincarnation? Is that what we’re talking about?’

  He was aware of making an effort to sound calm, almost casual, neither shocked nor offended by the idea. In fact he was asking himself whether, on some unconscious level, the thought had not already crossed his mind.

  Clare shrugged. ‘I don’t even know if they’re the same thing. Maybe you can be born with the memory of somebody’s past life without being that person reborn.’

  He made some noncommittal noise. At some point, without noticing, he too must have swung his feet off the bed, because he now found himself pacing the floor. ‘Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves,’ he said. ‘If every child with a vivid imagination is going to be accused of being a reincarnated soul . . .’

  ‘No one’s accusing her. It’s just a possibility that maybe we should consider.’

  ‘You’re right. Sorry, I didn’t mean to . . . it’s just that an idea like this takes some getting used to. The first thing we need to do is spend some time with Brendan Hunt and get his perspective on all this.’

  They knew that sleep was not going to come easily to either of them. Clare started packing, while Tom went through his email. It didn’t take long, and he was about to sign off when he had an idea. He brought up a search engine and typed one word into the find box: ‘Reincarnation’.

  He was not prepared for what came up. There were over two hundred thousand responses. Mostly they came from addresses like Beliefnet.com, Spiritweb.org, Mystica.com, and Tarotplanet.com. There was a lot of material from the Theosophical Society, much talk of karma, various ongoing debates about why Buddhists accepted the doctrine but Christians didn’t; and, frankly, a number of contributions from the sort of people he would have hoped never to find himself alone in a room with.

  All the same, when he thought about it, he realized that he had always considered Buddhism the sanest of all religions. Buddhists didn’t worship icons and they didn’t bludgeon people’s heads because of quarrels over dogma.

  But they believed in reincarnation. From the Dalai Lama on down.

  Could he really understand that idea, he asked himself, as anything more than a metaphor? Because a metaphor would not do. It was only the shadow, a reflection of something else, a way of using one thing to illuminate another. This thing had to be the real thing or nothing at all.

  When at last they went to bed, they lay awake in the dark, talking softly, in circles.

  16

  Julia said nothing at breakfast about the proposed visit to her ‘mommy’s home’ that she had been so keen on the night before. Nor were there any references to ‘Melanie’ or her ‘other life’. She didn’t even object when Tom announced that they were going home a day earlier than planned. He and Clare had agreed that if she made a scene they would be quite open with her and tell her that they wanted her to see Dr Hunt.

  But in the event she just nodded matter-of-factly, almost as though she had been expecting the announcement. Then she said she would like to go and play with Charlotte. Clare went with her. They had agreed, as a precaution, that they were not going to let her out of the sight of either one or the other of them until they were on the plane. They didn’t really think that she would run off in search of this imaginary mother, but they weren’t about to take the chance.

  Tom stayed behind to take care of their bags and to check out, then he went out to the play area where he knew they would be. There was an indoor area, with a pool, and an outdoor one with no pool. They were outdoors. Charlotte’s father was supervising the girls on slides and roundabouts – stuff for kids a little younger than themselves, but because there were two of them they were having a good time.

  Their mothers sat at a table nearby, drinking coffee. Tom sat down with them and poured himself a cup. It was as ordinary a scene, at least outwardly, as you would find anywhere: families on vacation having visited the tourist sights and now keeping the children entertained.

  Clare was telling Pam about Tom’s trawl on the Web for stuff on reincarnation and how much of it he had found. Pam admitted she knew nothing about the subject: it had just stuck in her mind after she read that one article years ago. Like Tom and Clare, she didn’t find it something she could believe in literally. She seemed anxious and strained, constantly glancing over to where the girls were playing. Tom wondered if she was afraid that Charlotte might catch the condition from Julia, then immediately reproached himself for the peevish tone of his thought. If he were in the position of Charlotte’s parents, he would feel the same: what was happening here was too strange to be entirely casual about.

  In fact both sets of parents were keeping their eyes on the girls pretty constantly, as though afraid they might vanish if left unobserved for a moment. Then Tom noticed that something was happening between Julia and Charlotte’s father, Harry. Julia was talking to him in the earnest way children have, backing up some request with a wealth of circumstantial detail so that he would have no reasonable excuse, so she thought, to refuse what she was asking.

  Harry listened solemnly, while his own daughter waited quietly on one side. This was nothing to do with her. Tom watched as Harry crouched down to respond to what Julia had said. As he spoke, he gestured in Tom’s direction, as though referring her to her parents for whatever it was she wanted.

  Tom and Clare were on their feet at the same time.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Tom said, ‘let me.’

  Clare sat back down, but kept her eyes on her daughter as Tom started over, making an effort to look casual, as though he was just being sociable. As he walked, he saw Julia glance at him out of the corner of her eye. She dropped the subject that she had been so eager to persuade Charlotte’s father about, and returned to playing with Charlotte. She led the way up the ladder of a helter-skelter which they had already skimmed down several times with shrieks of laughter.

  ‘What was all that?’ Tom asked.

  Harry stood with his hands in his pockets, looking perplexed. ‘It was weird. She suddenly started on about how I had to take her to visit her mommy. She said her daddy wouldn’t take her, so please would I? We could just pretend we were going for a walk, and Charlotte could come too, but we should go get my car.’

  ‘What did you tell her?’

  ‘I said we shouldn’t do that without your permission, so I suggested we go talk to you about it. But she wouldn’t do that. She said you’d just say no.’

  Their silence was broken by the girls’ laughter as they reached the end of their ride, and started around the back to go again.

/>   ‘OK, thanks, Harry,’ Tom said. As he spoke, he glanced Julia’s way. She was paying him no attention and seemed absorbed in her game with Charlotte. At the same time, he saw Clare get up from her table, leave Pam, and start towards them.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Tom said when she got nearer. ‘Crisis averted.’

  ‘What happened?’

  He explained – with Harry hovering in the background to verify and elaborate on everything he said. Tom would have liked him to shut up, but it was hard to tell him. Besides, he was so conscious of the pain in his wife’s face every time Julia’s ‘other mommy’ was referred to that he had no thought but for her.

  Clare looked at her watch. ‘I think we could get out of here,’ she said. ‘I’d rather wait a little longer at the airport.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Tom said. ‘Let’s go.’

  As he turned to call Julia over, he heard Pam’s voice.

  ‘Charlotte – where’s Julia?’

  The next thing he saw was Charlotte getting off the slide – alone. He felt his heart miss a beat as fear shot through him like an electric shock.

  There was no sign of Julia.

  His attention, the separate attentions of all four adults, could not have been distracted for more than a few seconds. Yet she was gone.

  Clare was already running across the grass, calling her name. Pam ran over to Charlotte and put her hands firmly on her shoulders.

  ‘Where is she? Did you see where she went?’

  The child shook her head, alarmed by the feel of adult panic around her.

  ‘Charlotte, we’re not blaming you,’ Tom said. ‘Please, just tell us if you know anything.’

  She looked up at him, blinking, as though convinced that she was going to be unfairly held responsible for something she had not done.

  ‘She said she had to go home.’

  ‘Where did she go? Which way?’

  Charlotte pointed towards a hedge behind a climbing frame in the shape of a fort. Tom ran towards it. Close up, he saw that there was a gap big enough for a child to slip through, though too small for an adult. He ran along it, looking for a way around.

  ‘Tom, over here!’

  He looked back and saw Clare waving him towards her. She had found a gate and disappeared through it before he got there. Harry was right behind him, but paused to shout back to Pam, ‘Stay with Charlotte. I’ll help them find her.’

  Clare was frantically searching the parking lot when Tom caught up with her, but there was no sign of Julia.

  ‘She can’t have got far,’ Harry was saying a little breathlessly. ‘It was just seconds.’

  Tom looked around desperately for some clue to where she might have gone, trying to think himself into his daughter’s mind. Then, about five hundred yards away, below where they were standing, he saw a handful of long-bodied green buses manoeuvring around a handful of concrete islands and covered pick-up points. ‘Harry – your car!’ he shouted. ‘Mine’s out front!’

  Charlotte’s father pulled a key from his pocket. ‘Here. It’s insured. I’ll check around the hotel.’

  Tom snatched the keys from him and was already behind the wheel before Clare jumped in beside him. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Down there. Look! She wanted Harry to drive her but he wouldn’t, so she’s taking the bus. That must be where she’s headed.’

  The car, a big sedan, was already moving, tyres protesting as Tom spun the featherlight powered steering this way and that, not giving a damn for the angry shouts from pedestrians and a couple of raised fists it got him. He made an illegal U-turn, bounced over a divider, and headed downhill. ‘Does she have money?’ he asked Clare.

  ‘Enough to take a bus. She had her pocket money with her.’

  The road down to the bus terminal curved gently to the left. There was an intersection coming up, and he tried to get there before the lights changed, but had to slam on his brakes at the last second. Neither he nor Clare was wearing a seatbelt; Clare grabbed the dash with both hands to stop herself being thrown forward.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She spoke without looking at him. Her eyes were scouring the distance for that small figure in a blue and yellow tracksuit with a white ribbon in her hair.

  ‘Better buckle up,’ Tom said.

  They both did. When the lights changed to amber, the car was already moving. He was driving badly, but it crossed his mind that if a cop pulled him over, he could probably enlist him in the search. It might be the best thing that could happen.

  The terminal, when they reached it, was more complex than it had looked from above. Regular traffic was routed around the edge, and he couldn’t find a way in.

  ‘Stop – let me get out and look.’

  Clare shot out of the car and stepped up on a concrete island, craning her head to get an overview of the place. People and vehicles crisscrossed in all directions. It was impossible to get a clear view of anything.

  Then he saw her, subliminally almost, just a flash of colour before she disappeared again, leaving him unsure whether he had imagined her or not.

  ‘Over there!’ he called to Clare, getting out of the car and pointing. She was already running. He sprinted after her. He heard the roaring engine before he saw the bus about to run him down. He managed to pull back, almost deafened by the horn’s blast. He ran around the rear of it, but by the time he emerged the other side he could see no sign of either Clare or Julia.

  He ran to the next island, and looked around in all directions. He caught sight of Clare so far from where she’d been that he didn’t know how she’d got there so quickly. She was trying to attract his attention, waving and pointing. He started to follow, but another bus got in his way.

  At one of the windows he saw, unmistakably, his daughter’s face. She didn’t look at him; she showed no sign of seeing him; and she flashed by in a second.

  But it was her.

  17

  Without taking his eyes off the bus, he swung the car over and pushed open the door for Clare to get in.

  ‘You shouldn’t have waited,’ she said.

  ‘Don’t worry, we’ve got her.’

  He pulled abruptly into traffic, accompanied by more angry honking, but he kept the bus in clear view. They followed it through two sets of lights, neither of which was red long enough for one of them to get out of the car and go pound on its door. At the third set, a truck jumped a light and got between them.

  When they got around the truck, they found themselves following two buses in place of one, with nothing to tell them which was which. Tom thumped the steering wheel.

  ‘Shit!’

  ‘It was the one on the right.’

  ‘How can you tell?’

  ‘Just from where it was.’

  ‘You’re wrong.’

  Suddenly they were fighting like married couples everywhere over who knows the way and whose fault it was they went wrong. Only this time it wasn’t funny. They both became acutely aware of that at the same moment, and fell silent.

  Clare reached over for his hand. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘My fault.’

  ‘No.’

  They drove in silence, and in silence they observed each bus choose a separate pre-selection which would take them in opposite directions. They had to make a choice.

  ‘Which one?’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know. Which do you . . . ?’

  ‘Right,’ he said.

  ‘Right.’

  He swung the wheel to follow. The road led up into tree-shaded avenues which branched off into residential streets.

  ‘Try to pass it,’ she said.

  ‘There isn’t room if he doesn’t pull over.’

  An oncoming car forced the driver of the bus to pull over a yard or so, but before Tom could get past he had drifted out again. Tom hit the horn, to no effect. He hit it again. Perfectly framed in his rear-view mirror, the driver’s left hand exten
ded a defiantly uncivil finger.

  Clare placed a restraining hand on Tom’s arm. ‘Wait till he stops. He’ll have to soon.’

  When he did, moments later, Tom swung the car past and pulled across the bus’s nose, blocking it. He saw the driver tense and reach for something under his dash as Tom ran towards him.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said to the driver, waving his open hands to show that he had no intention of attacking him. ‘We’re looking for our daughter. She’s eight years old.’

  Clare had run to the other side of the bus where three or four people were getting down. As soon as the way was clear, she ran up the steps and inside.

  ‘Hey lady!’ the driver called out indignantly. But she was already halfway back, checking every seat.

  Tom came around and started to climb the steps. The driver reached under his dash again. Tom could see a radio, and a knuckleduster next to it.

  ‘Look,’ he said, ‘we just want our daughter, that’s all.’

  The driver relaxed a little. ‘How old did you say she was?’

  ‘Eight.’

  ‘Well, she’s not on this bus.’

  Tom looked down the centre aisle. Clare was already returning with disappointment on her face, shaking her head.

  ‘OK,’ Tom said. ‘I’m sorry.’ Then added, ‘Thanks,’ as they got off. The driver hit a button and shut the doors, glad to be rid of them. Curious faces peered down from the windows as they ran to their car, made a quick turn, and headed back in the direction they had come from.

  ‘It’s got to be the other one,’ Tom said. ‘It had to be one of those two.’

  He took a right that looked like a short cut back to the road they had left. He was acutely aware that the other bus could by now have taken some untraceable route, but left that fear unspoken. So did Clare, though he was quite sure she shared it.

  They found the main road and drove for several minutes. Then Clare said, ‘It must have turned off.’ Her voice was taut with anxiety.

  Tom didn’t say anything, just kept driving.